Refuting misleading claims about Safe Communities Act
By Canton CitizenDear Editor:
As a statewide immigrant advocacy organization, we were concerned to read the deeply misleading letter from John Thompson of the Massachusetts Coalition for Immigration Reform posted on the Canton Citizen website in response to a recent column by state Representative William Galvin regarding the Safe Communities Act.
Contrary to Thompson’s claims, nothing in the bill would prevent cooperation between local and federal police to investigate and prosecute crimes, including the sharing of information for that purpose. Nor would the bill prevent ICE from doing its job, or from questioning people in custody about immigration issues — but it would provide basic due process by requiring that people be informed of their right to call a lawyer and to consent to such questioning, just as our Constitution requires for police interviews.
The bill instead ensures that valuable police resources are not wasted on civil immigration enforcement and provides clear guidance for police interactions with ICE. Such policies promote public safety by increasing community confidence in police and other local agencies so that immigrant state residents feel safe seeking protection from domestic violence, wage theft, housing code violations, and any manner of other abuses that can now be visited on them with impunity, with perpetrators secure in the knowledge that their victims are too afraid to seek help. We hear about such cases every day, from all corners of our commonwealth.
While Thompson might imagine that Trump’s policies and inflammatory rhetoric have no impact on law-abiding immigrants, we know from our work that immigrant state residents — no matter what their status — are going underground, afraid that any contact with government agencies could result in separation from children or other family members. That’s why we are one of the 170 organizations supporting the Massachusetts Safe Communities Act. We are deeply grateful to Representative Galvin and the bill’s other 94 legislative sponsors for standing up for the civil rights and safety of all state residents.
Amy Grunder
Director of Legislative Affairs
Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition
Short URL: https://www.thecantoncitizen.com/?p=38055
Posted by Canton Citizen
on Jan 27 2018. Filed under From One Citizen to Another, Opinion.
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
